Arnold Hayes
Twenty-one candidates qualified to run for at-large seats on the Metro Council.
The campaign for at-large is unique. Because the top five vote-getters win, candidates typically remain positive, and surprising candidates can sneak into the winners’ circle.
Early voting for Metro Council and mayoral elections starts July 14, with Election Day following Aug. 3. A runoff, if needed, would come in September.
Our latest Q&A with an at-large candidate features Arnold Hayes, a former Ford engineer, math teacher and community oversight board and NAACP leader.
Previously, we spoke with candidates Burkley Allen, Russ Pulley, Quin Evans Segall, Marcia Masulla, Jeff Syracuse, Zulfat Suara, Delishia Porterfield, Jonathan Williamson, Indrani Ray and Howard Jones. This interview has been edited for length.
In 2018 and 2019, with police shootings in Nashville, and the following year with the George Floyd protests, there was a lot of attention around police violence. Do you think that attention has waned? If so, is that a problem?
Attention always wanes when it comes to officer-involved shootings like that. People are really energized the closer you are to the event, but as you get farther away from the event, people start saying "it really wasn't that bad." You can look back at the examples in Nashville. You can look back at Jocques Clemmons. It started to wane then, and then right after that it was Daniel Hambrick. George Floyd, and Tyre Nichols in Memphis. It always tends to happen that way, so it's to be expected. That's why it's been such a challenge to actually maintain effective community oversight over the years. It's just human nature. When you get far away from a tragedy like that, hindsight says it probably wasn't as bad as we thought it was. You start rationalizing. I'm an engineer and I love math. I'm looking at sine and cosine waves where they go up and down. That's typically the cycle you'd expect with officer-involved shootings.
How should Metro conduct police oversight going forward in light of the changes made by the state?
I'm very disappointed with what the state did in terms of attempts to eliminate the community oversight board. What really is needed is for us to realize that we were really making progress with the community oversight board. Most citizens probably don't realize that, even with the challenges, there were so many advisory reports and complaints that were actually accepted by the police chief and they were implemented. There was some progress made in terms of working toward having more trust. What needs to be done right now is the council and the mayor, the current and incoming mayor, need to do everything they can to ensure the staff that we have stays in place. If the staff is eliminated it'll be almost like starting over again. One of the important parts of community oversight is having independent investigators. We'll go back to having the police investigating themselves.
So keeping the funding for staff and trying to figure out how to do it with the restrictions in place?
Besides keeping the staff, we have to push for legal action to actually get the community oversight board back. It's been said that it's better to have no community oversight board than to have a weak oversight board. If this board is allowed in the format that's been proposed, people are really going to lose trust in the effectiveness of the board. They're going to not trust the findings of the board because the board is going to get all of their information from the police department. Again, we're back where we started. It has to be coupled with the incoming mayor and council pushing, whether it's Metro Legal or outside counsel, to actually fight back in the courts on this. Otherwise, 134,000 voters meant nothing.
You've said we don't necessarily need more police. Instead, if we eliminate certain dangers related to guns in the first place, there would be less need for officers, you said. What can Metro Council actually do about guns?
It concerns me when I hear so many people in the media and politicians that basically say, "Police are so brave, they're charging into danger." For example with the case of the Covenant shooting, yes they were brave to do that. But they shouldn't have to go into situations like that. I don't know to what extent we'll be able to have gun reform, but we have to start somewhere. Starting with background checks would be a good place to start. What can the council do? One of my goals is to do everything I can to protect the citizens of Davidson County. Whether or not it's things like assault weapons or food insecurity or lack of housing. Whenever these laws are coming down from the state, I would make sure they are legally sound. I would want to find ways we could get around them in Davidson County. If there are things we could implement that just affects Davidson County, because one of my goals is to protect the citizens of Davidson County.
Regarding state legislation, you've also said the council and the mayor could have been more proactive in protecting the people of Davidson County. What would that have looked like?
I think they could have been more aggressive. The legislature is out of session right now. What other laws are going to come down? We need to be proactive. We need to start thinking ahead, because we know with this general assembly there's always going to be something coming. We should still have our one U.S. congressional person. We have three congressional representatives that I would feel very uncomfortable going to if I had an issue. The council did a really good job pushing back when they were trying to downsize the council. They did a good job pushing back at the renaming of John Lewis Way. They should have also been pushing back for the community oversight board. They probably should have been pushing back harder for the sports authority. They should have been pushing back for everything. A lot of times people think cities don't have any power, but they do have some power. We have a separation of governments. The state offered $500 million for the Titans stadium. If I would have been on the council, I would have been advocating for the state to stay out of Nashville's governance, and if not, I would have told them to take that money back. You have to be willing to fight back when necessary. There are cases where the city can fight back but they have to be willing to do it.
What would you advocate for if the racetrack negotiations are still going on and you are on council?
On the Titans stadium, my position on that was that the voters should have had a chance to vote on it. At bare minimum there should have been a lot more community engagement when it comes to projects like this. I would say the same thing on the racetrack. Since one of the things I'm very concerned about is the economic disparities we have in this city, on any type of project like that, whatever profit is coming from that project, I want to know how is this going to help poor and working people. What percentage of this project is going to making sure, for example, a person that finds themself homeless but one reason they became homeless was because they lost their job, and they needed another $300 to make their mortgage or rent payment, is there any type of subsidies we could have? I applaud the Barnes Fund, but we really need to do more of that, having places where people can get help. If we're going to do the racetrack or any other project, I want to know how is this going to help working and poor people.
Should there be a dedicated funding source for transit?
There needs to be dedicated funding for transit, but there are so many other things there needs to be dedicated funding, whether it's housing, you have food insecurity, you have mental health issues. You have a number of things like that where there needs to be some type of dedicated funding. But yes, I think there ought to be dedicated funding for transit. The reason being is that the problem is not going to go away. The problem is still present. If anything, the problem has gotten worse. I would support dedicated funding, but if it's going to be dedicated funding for transit I still want to know how is that going to help working and poor people. Is it going to make it easier for them to get to work? Is it going to put more dollars in their pockets? Is it going to make their lives better? If I'm spending all this money on transit, is it going to be fair? Minority businesses and small businesses, are they going to be able to participate in this project?
So you're more concerned with how residents get around town than how tourists get to and from the airport or other similar uses?
All of those are important. Transit is transit. If the interstate is blocked, and I've had to move to Clarksville or Mt. Juliet, I can't get to work whether it's the airport or downtown. Transit is transit.
You've said we need to improve the budget process, that the council and taxpayers need a bigger role. What does that look like?
One of the things it looks like is, I'd like to see more civic involvement with the citizens of Davidson County. One way is to get a chance to serve on boards. There's an awful lot of funding for different projects; it starts with the commissions and the boards. Similar to the way the community oversight board was set up, where you have organizations like Gideon's Army, NAACP, NOAH, Urban League, Fraternal Order of Police, that they get a chance to recommend people for the board. Right now, it really basically is left up to the mayor. I think they've improved it a little bit. Councillady Sepulveda made a few improvements with that. I'm talking about going a lot further, where you have people that typically don't get on these boards, that perhaps don't have all the degrees and all the work experience, but they have life experience that would be helpful to the board. It would be very helpful if even citizens were involved more in the process up front. There are some things we could do to improve that. The strong mayor design that we have here, I do wish the council could have a little bit more say in the budget up front. If you look back at most council budgets, and you look at the percentage that the council affects the budget, it was probably very minimal. I'm not saying all the authority needs to be taken away from the mayor. The council needs to have more authority when it comes to the spending of the budget.
And you think participatory budgeting is an effective use of money?
It's an effective use of money, but compared to the budget it's so small. The meetings that I have been to, it's pretty much still the mayor's office leading the community. Some people just don't know about the budgeting process. I would rather have more community people going to the mayor with their proposals, versus the city coming and saying, "I've got $2 million. What do you want to do with it?" I just think there's room for improvement. I'm not criticizing everything with that process. I'm glad it was done. That was something that had never been done in Nashville. I'd just like to push the envelope more.
You also say you will push for equity in waste disposal, in part by opposing expansion of the Bordeaux landfill. Landfills all across the region and country are filling up. What should we do about that?
I would expand the Green Hills or the Hermitage or the West End landfill. Why should Bordeaux have to be the only place that takes on the city waste. That is totally unfair. I don't believe waste needs to be on the backs of primarily Black and brown people. We all should share. I guess we're paying now to send stuff outside the county. I strongly believe in the team concept. I believe we just need to get in a room, stakeholders and people affected. How has this affected your life? Talk to some of them and then let's decide what's the best place for us to actually dispose of our waste. The problem is not going to go away if you just ignore it. It wasn't fair in the '50s and '60s when this was done on the backs of Black and brown people. This is 2023, and it's still not fair. Yes I would be totally against that. Yes I would strongly oppose that.
Sort of on the same theme, a lot of neighborhoods oppose new affordable housing in their area. How do you convince neighbors to accept density or affordable housing in their area?
I would like to advocate for and champion the citizens of Davidson County. When it comes to affordable housing, it needs to be equally distributed. When it comes to affordable housing, each one of the 35 districts, we need to have some affordable housing in each one of those districts. I don't think one or two or three areas should be burdening that. It needs to be across the board. It needs to be fairly distributed across Davidson County. You may think you're secure today, but you have one medical issue, your savings and everything get drained, and then you find yourself without housing. That could happen to any of us. Having people like me on the council, I think I would be able to explain that we are in this together and we do want people to be able to stay in this city. We want the people that serve us, whether it's teachers, police officers, the people that work in restaurants — we don't want them to have to live in Manchester. I think we can do it. I want Nashville to do better and I think Nashville is capable of doing better. We've risen to the occasion before and now it's time to do it again.
How do you get housing built? How does Metro support that?
If there's any development project, I want to know what percentage of this is going to help working and poor people. That also applies to affordable housing. Whatever company you have coming here, whether it's Oracle, you name it, that has to be part of that upfront deal.
You mean if we're giving them something?
If we're giving them these tax breaks, there has to be something that the city is getting back for it. We also need to look at the jobs that are coming here. Are local residents getting any of those jobs? What's your track record when you did the same thing in New York or St. Louis or Miami? What percentage of the residents end up getting jobs with your company? I'm advocating for the marginalized and the underserved. Am I advocating for other people? Yes, I am. But I think they're going to be OK anyway. It's the people that are really struggling in this city that's one of the reasons I decided to run.
Are you supporting anyone for mayor?
I decided to stay out of publicly stating anyone I support for mayor. We have some great candidates running and I know quite a few of them would do a great job as mayor. On top of that, I thought it would be easier for me to work with the next mayor if I stayed out of that race. It'll work itself out.
How do you want the next mayor to operate?
I'd like to see a mayor that's more community-oriented. Rather than top-down directives, I'd like to see a mayor that is engaged in the community. I'd like to see a mayor that does not just come to the council and say, "This is what I want done, and this is how soon I want it done." I do believe in the power of teams coming together. The mayor and the council, we could work together as a team and help move this city forward. Rather than having a more dictator-type thing, I would like to have a mayor that's a team player, and realize that everything we do we're trying to do for the betterment of the city. I would have hoped that on the stadium deal, if there would have been a lot more engagement with the council and the city before a lot of major decisions had to be made, there really wasn't enough time for that.
Is there a role for Metro to be involved in supporting child care in the city?
There's always a need for that. As a person that raised three now-adult children, my first wife of 35 years has since passed and I remarried. Now I have adult stepchildren. I wanted to mention how difficult it was. I had a wife at the time that really wanted to do a lot of things. She had the skills to do different things outside the home. She wanted to make sure our children were raised right, so she made that sacrifice until later on, and she did a lot more things after they got to that point. I don't think it's fair, especially for women. I know you have a lot more men that are doing that now. We need to do everything we can to make sure that we have safe places for children while parents are working. One of the things we always struggled with was what we were going to do with the kids in the summer. You have so many parents that work two and three jobs and it would be so wonderful if you had more after-school programs children could go to. I strongly support any form of child care, and I would definitely sponsor legislation for something like that.
You talk about emergency housing, particularly in the summer. What would you push for legislatively in terms of homelessness?
I don't necessarily have any legislation on that particular issue yet, but I do know what some of the problems are. One of the problems is, a lot of times the shelters may get filled up. People have nowhere to go. Sometimes people are uncomfortable going [to shelters] because they're concerned about their safety. I would like to see more things measured in the city. Do we know whether it's improving or not? Do we know whether or not we have less homelessness than we did a year ago? Are we making any progress? If we don't have these facilities, if we don't have a place when it's 105 outside or when it's minus-10 degrees, what are we going to do? Is there a warehouse or something we can open up and make an emergency shelter? I do not want a person out on the street in weather like that and all the sudden they pass away. If I'm on the council, I'm concerned about what happens under my watch. I would prefer to talk to the people. I'm not an expert on housing, but I know there are people out there that are that already have ideas. I would like to listen to them. I would love to do more listening than talking on the council.
We've talked about some big ideas, some of which would cost a lot of money. Is there anywhere you could support cuts being made to government spending?
There's always places you can cut in a budget. We need to be smart with our budget. A lot of times when you talk about taking things away from the police, it's like, "Oh, you're not pro-police." You do have to have people in the job they're best suited for. If there are situations where police officers don't have to do the work of a social worker, in some cases. There may be some cases where you definitely have to have a police officer. There are a lot of things we have police officers do that probably is not the best use of their time. Let's take traffic stops. I know traffic stops are important, especially if somebody is speeding, but if it's taking away from a police officer really working on serious crimes like murder or rape, but you're utilizing them on parking downtown. You need to make sure you have the right people for the right job. It's not fair for a police officer to have to deal primarily with mental health issues. There are some other things. I love parks. I love libraries. If there has to be a decision, and if someone is going to be able to stay in a house versus I get a chance to get another greenway somewhere, it needs to be a priority. I'm not saying I'm not supportive of those things, but I think the citizens of Davidson County, their basic needs need to be met first. Some of those are housing, food security, jobs.
You mentioned traffic stops as potentially wasting police time or resources. Is there a role for license plate readers in reducing that?
License plate readers is very complicated. We have the trial going on. There have been so many situations where there are so many things that are untested as far as the identification of the wrong person and it can cost them their life. One reason I say traffic stops is because Gideon's Army and The Policing Project, they did a study and they said traffic stops were not effective. If it's something that's not really being effective, it's really doing almost nothing to deter crime, why do it? If license plate readers is to reduce traffic stops, I don't see where license plate readers are going to do that. I would be willing to talk to anyone. I am an engineer at heart and by training. I would like to look at the data. Then I would make a decision based on that and what my constituents want me to do.
